Chapter 3.4: Fallacies of Presumption, Ambiguity, and Illicit Transference

Question 1

Petitio Principii (Begging the quesiton)

Answer 1

Creates an illusion that an inadequate premises provide adequate support for the conclusion by leaving out a possibly false (shaky) key premise, by restating a possibly false premise as the conclusion, or by reasoning in a circle.

Question 2

Complex Question

Answer 2

Occurs when two (or more) questions are asked in the guise of a single question and single answer is then given to both of them. Every complex question presumes the existence of a certain condition. When the respondents answer is added to the complex question, an argument emerges that establishes the presumed condition.
This argument is usually intended to trap the respondent into acknowledging something that he ore she might otherwise not want to acknowledge.

Question 3

False Dichotomy

Answer 3

Occurs when a disjunctive (“either…or…”) premise presents two unlikely alternatives as if they were the only ones available, and the arguer then eliminates the undesirable alternative, leaving the desirable one as the conclusion.

Question 4

Suppressed Evidence

Answer 4

A fallacy that occurs when the arguer ignores relevant evidence that outweighs the presented evidence and entails a very different conclusion.

Question 5

Equivocation

Answer 5

An informal fallacy that occurs because some word or group of words is used either implicitly or explicitly in two different senses. (play on words/ambiguity in words).

Question 6

Amphiboly

Answer 6

An informal fallacy that occurs when the conlusion of an argument depends on the misinterpretationof a statement that is ambiguous owing to some structural defect. (ambiguity in the phrase).

Question 7

Composition

Answer 7

An informal fallacy that occurs when the conclusion of an argument depends on the erroneous transference of an attribute from the parts of something onto the whole. (part -> whole)

Question 8

Division

Answer 8

An informal fallacy that occurs when the confusion of an argument depends on the erroneous transference of an attribute form a whole onto its parts. (whole -> part).

Question 9

Fallacies of Illicit Transference

Answer 9

Includes composition and division. occurs when the incorrect transference of an attribute from the parts of something onto the whole, or from the whole onto the parts.

Question 10

Fallacies of presumption

Answer 10

these fallacies occur because the premises presume what they claim to prove.

Question 11

Fallacies of ambiguity

Answer 11

arise from the occurrence of some form of ambiguity in either the premises or the conclusion (or both).